Local reaction Monday to President Obama's decision to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan was mixed.
Obama is expected to give a major policy speech on Afghanistan at 8 tonight.
Even among the veterans there is no strong consensus on what the country should do about the eight-year-old war, according to Mike Brown,
commander of Morris Memorial Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1417.
"Everybody's got different opinions about what's going on," Brown said.
But the one thing that is clear is that no one wants the money spent and lives lost to go to waste, he said.
There are about 110,000 coalition troops in Afghanistan, including 68,000 Americans.
Obama has decided to deploy about 30,000 more troops on top of the 21,000 additional troops sent over earlier this year. U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal had requested 40,000 soldiers.
Brown said two members of the post have recently deployed to Afghanistan.
This year will see the highest number of casualties of any year of the conflict. As of Nov. 30, there have been 484 coalition fatalities, including 298 American deaths. Annual fatalities stayed below 100 for the first three years of the war.
Obama is lobbying other nations to increase their troop numbers and the British announced Monday they were sending 500 more soldiers to bring their level to around 10,000 "" the second highest of any nation.
One consensus among the veterans seems to be that more countries should be shouldering the burden, Brown said.
"We shouldn't be the only ones putting the troops in there," Brown said.
Ben Eldred, commander of American Legion Post 259 in Oneonta, said the club doesn't have an official position on the Afghanistan war.
"We usually support whatever the military is doing," Eldred said.
But Eldred said there needs to be some decisive action.
"It's either get out entirely or finish the job," Eldred said.
Adrian Kuzminski, a local opponent of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, said he is disappointed that Obama, who he said was elected in part on an anti-war tide, has not committed to drawing down the forces in Afghanistan.
"My view certainly hasn't changed," Kuzminski of Fly Creek said.
Kuzminski said the insertion of 30,000 more troops into the war amounts to a major escalation.
"McChrystal got most of what he wanted," Kuzminski said.
Kuzminski said the conflict was an occupation.
"If the situation were reversed and for whatever reason we had an occupying army in Otsego County, we probably wouldn't be very happy about that," Kuzminski said.
